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Trojan Horse
"Trojan Horse" is the 19th episode of season 2, and the 43rd produced hour of Person of Interest. It originally aired on April 4, 2013. Synopsis Two men are on the phone saying that she is asking to many questions about Justin Lee, an engineer who died in an accident, and one guy says it will be taken care of. Harold Finch and Carl Elias are playing chess wth each other. Elias communicates with Finch through the chess pieces what his plans are. Finch observes that the deaths of Detective Bill Szymanski and Assistant District Attorney Melinda Wright benefited his enemy, Peter Yogorov, and that a number of his associates inside have recently been transferred out of Rikers. Finch asks who is he playing against, and Elias points to Finch's King on the chess board and says he's playing against someone he hasn't identified, but would very much like to. Elias says he still has a few moves left. After he leaves the cell, Finch receives a call with a new number. Reese is watching a man enter a house, and reading a magazine that states Michael Cole was dealing with the militia and was gunned down by them. He then receives a call from Finch telling him that they have a new number, Monica Jacobs, senior VP of strategies and systems at Rylatech. Finch poses as an IT manager and enters the Rylatech building to spy on her. When he bluejacks her phone, she walks over and talks to him about the new equipment he delieved, and amazed at his knowledge of it. Afterward, a meeting takes place between the executives of Rylatech and a VP wondering why he should se their product. Carter is talking to Detective Terney about Detective Symanski's homicide, and he says that they have no trail as to who did it. Finch then calls Carter and tells her he is sorry about Szymanski's death, when Cal Beecher comes and tries to talk to her, but she says that until he gives the name of the CI that framed Szymanski and later got him killed, they are not talking. She then asks Fusco to look into Beecher to see if he knowingly set up Szymanski to be killed. Finch is still at the building watching Monica and is talking to Reese on the phone, and he jokes that Finch might have a crush on Monica, which Finch refutes. She then gets up to leave, and Finch follows her, but she enters the R&D storage room looking for a specific laptop, going out of her way to avoid Rylatech's security guards. She then starts copying files from a certain laptop onto a flash drive and then leaves. Finch asks Reese why would she be stealing files, and Reese says that the CIA taught him that the best spy was the one you would least expect. Shaw then appears behind Reese with a gun. He says he thought he would find her here. The people they are spying on Cole's parents. He says that he knows the government framed Cole as a domestic terrorist, and he knew Shaw would come to set the record straight. Reese warns Shaw not to talk to Cole's parents, as the government may kill them too. Shaw tells Reese to get some fresh air somewhere else and departs. Meanwhile at Rylatech, Finch is still watching Monica. As soon as she leaves her office, he quickly enters and tries to download the files she took from the laptop the previous night. However, Monica's assistant Jerome Eckert enters the office before Finch can begin and questions why is Finch in there. He makes the excuse that he is uploading a new security patch to protect against a specific and severe virus. He then departs the office. Fusco approaches Beecher in the bathroom and says that by him being quiet, it makes it look like he set Szymanski up to be killed. Beecher retorts that he knows about Fusco's past, and he is being hypocritical to call Beecher dirty. Fusco says that he needs to stay away from Carter, and Beecher asks what will happen if he doesn't, but Fusco just smirks and they glare at each other, until Terney enters and asks what's going on. Fusco says that it's a good question and leaves. Back at Rylatech, Monica leaves the building and talks to Ross Haskell about the death of Justin Lee, one of his engineers. She says that something is wrong, because when she sent flowers to his parents, no one by the name of Lee was at his address. She says that everything about Lee from his contact information to his work history was a lie. She says that she thinks he might have been a plant, and Haskell asks for whom, which she says it could be anyone, and hands him the flash drive she used to download Lee's information from the laptop she took. They then depart, and Finch says he needs to see that flash drive, and will have to come up with a reason to get into Haskell's office. But Reese arrives and just pickpockets it from Haskell. Beecher later meets up with Alonzo Quinn, who was his CI and gave the information about Szymanski. But Beecher says he is worried about all the questions, and is getting concerned. He asks where did the tip come from, because a dead detective's reputation is on the line. Quinn lies and says the tip came from one of Elias' soldiers. After Beecher leaves, Simmons approaches Quinn and asks if Beecher will be a problem; to which Quinn replies that he hopes not. Back at The Library, Reese says that Monica never was a spy, but was hunting one. Finch says that the threat is most likely coming from whoever Lee was spying for, and says he asked Carter to look into his death. All of the sudden, Finch notices that Monica's phone is being flooded with fake information, and she tries to enter her office, but security will not let her. Rylatech CEO Martin Baxter and Haskell say it looks like she was conducting corporate espionage, and she is fired, effective immediately with civil and criminal charges pending. She tries to explain and asks Jerome to help her, but he says that she has been acting strange recently and security takes her out. Finch tells Reese that someone is trying to silence her, and that they won't still until they do... permanently. The next day, Monica is standing outside Rylatech's entrance. Finch finds out the Justin Lee's whole life was fake, and that he was a spy, and Monica was on to him, explaining why she was framed. When Jerome exits the building, she starts trailing him. Beecher meets with Elias in prison, and asks questions while playing chess. Elias says that Szymanski was clean, and he needs to play his next move wisely, or someone else will for him; he then departs from the cell. Finch then asks Carter if she has looked into Justin Lee's death, but she says that it looked like a simple accident, so she looked into it deeper. She tried to get fingerprints from his body, but it disappeared. Finch is visibly shocked at hearing this. Quinn meets with Simmons who says Beecher is looking for answers, and Quinn says its "a damn shame." Simmons asks if they should promote him to a desk job somewhere else, but Quinn says that he always told Beecher to be careful because being a policeman is a dangerous job; both Quinn and Simmons are visibly saddened by this. Jerome is on the phone talking in Mandarin Chinese saying that "She was dealt with yesterday, our operation is no longer in jeopardy." Monica approaches him and asks why did he say what he said the previous day, but he asks why is she following him and shoves her away, but Reese slams him against the car and asks who is he working for. Jerome says that Reese is wasting his time, and that there are too many of them. A sniper shoots from one of the nearby buildings, kills Jerome and tries to kill Reese and Monica. Finch calls and says that Lee's father was a high-ranking official in the Chinese government, and that Lee was spying for his country, not a company. Reese drives away to safety, and Shaw enters the library to a stunned Finch. Finch asks why is Shaw here, and she says that he gave her his number. He says he imagined she would call instead of paying him a visit in person, but says this can work out as well. He says that his offer still stands, but she shows him a news story regarding leaked CIA documents of Michael Cole being an undercover agent uncovering a domestic terrorism plot and hints that Finch hacked the agency and created an employee who previously didn't exist. She then sees a picture of Root, who threatened her in a hotel, takes it and leaves. Reese and Monica are at a hotel, and she seems surprised the Lee was a spy for China. Reese asks why would Lee be spying on Rylatech, and Monica says there proprietary designs keep them at the forefront of the industry, and maybe they were trying to steal or sabotage their work. Finch then arrives at the room and says they need to get to the bottom of who is trying to kill her. Finch says they needed someone high in the chain of command, and Monica realizes that Haskell was in charge of Lee, and the only one she told about him. They begin to hack into Rylatech. Monica states that she was offered many other jobs dring her 10 years at Rylatech, and they were her family. As they continue trying to get pass Ryalatech's firewall, they get hacked and their computer is sabotaged, causing it to overheat and explode. They realize that they need to break into Rylatech and access the servers manually. They plant Monica's ID card on Bear and let him inside the building. The security guards see that Monica has come back and go after her, only to find Bear who chases them into a room. Reese and Monica then enter the building, go to the server room, and install a transmitter on the catalog server. Finch then goes through the information, and realizes that half of the senior staff are spies. Finch realizes that the spies are not spying on Rylatech, but are using its products to spy on the whole country. The spies become aware of Reese and Monica and attack them. Reese stops them, and they make their way to Haskell's office, only to find him murdered. Baxter appears behind them with a gun, and orders Reese to drop his weapon. Horrified, Monica asks Baxter why would he do this, and Martin says that he only was protecting what he built. He says that when the dot com bubble hit, the company went bankrupt, and Rylatech was a perfect takeover company. Then an opportunity came, and Reese realizes that Martin sold his country out to save Rylatech. Martin says that the world has changed, and says that patriotism is an outdated notion, and companies have to look forward to the future by controlling information. He prepares to kill Monica and frame her for Haskell's murder, when Finch calls and says that he has notified the authorities, and given incriminating evidence to the FBI. Greer then calls Baxter and says that the time has come, and that his family will be taken care of. Martin says he understands, and then shoots himself. Finch asks if they are okay, and Reese says they are. When they are about to leave, Reese sees that all the guards are gone. A nearby pay phone then rings near Finch. Back at the precinct, Carter asks Fusco what is going on. Fusco shows her the recording of Beecher talking to Elias, and says that Beecher was trying to find out what was going on as well, and that he was clean, and HR used him. Carter tries to send the recording to IAB, but Fusco says that it wasn't an approved wiretap. He says Carter should stay away from Beecher for her own safety. Beecher is sitting in his car with his CI, about to make a drug bust. Carter calls him and says they need to meet. The drug dealer snatches Beecher's CI's money and starts running away, and the CI and Beecher chase after them. His finds his CI, who betrays him, and the drug dealers start shooting at Beecher, who calls for backup. Finch calls Carter and tells that Beecher's life is in danger, just before Fusco comes and says that a cop called for help (Beecher). When they arrive, they find Beecher and his CI were killed, and leave. The next day, news outlets talk about Martin Baxter and Ross Haskell's death, and that Rylatech's stocks plunged after hearing of spies in the companies ranks. A federal investigation is launched into the company, and it is shut down, and all government technology bought from Rylatech is replaced. Reese and Finch talk about Beecher's death and meet with Monica and ask how she is doing. She responds that she is doing well, seeing that the company she devoted 10 years to is under federal investigation. They ask what is she going to do, and she says she has had some job offers, and that the most interesting is the one from IFT. They wish each other the best and depart. Reese says that Finch is going to miss her, but Finch says he would if he had time. He says that when he was looking at Rylatech's information, he saw code signatures similar to the virus Kara Stanton uploaded into The Machine. Finch says he decrypted the virus's code and learned 2 things: first, only a fraction of the information made it to the Chinese government, the rest went to another organization. Finch believes they were the ones who sent the final call to Baxter. He dug further but could only find a name; Decima Technologies. Second, Finch says he believes they created the virus to find and infect a single target; The Machine. Greer then appears right behind them on he phone and says that they unfortunately have to pull up stakes with Rylatech, but as expected, the US is focused totally on China's involvement, and not theirs. He quickly adds that there has been one small crinkle; the breach of there encrypted network appears to be the work of a single individual, and that Greer will do everything in his power to determine that man's identity, and render him, irrelevant. (He is then shown from a nearby camera with a red box) He says that their larger operation is still on schedule, hangs up, looks at a countdown on his phone, and smiles. Episode Notes *There is increased vigilance on the part of the US Congress regarding implementation of new guidelines on large-scale purchases of technology equipment made in China, which was the concept underlying this episode. The concern is that "back doors", unobtrusive means of accessing computer systems with little chance of detection, can be installed, or that "sniffer chips" can be implanted in the computer systems of American companies which operate in China, making them vulnerable to compromise. * Finch identifies the virus code as originating with Decima Technologies. Decima is the name of one of the three Fates responsible for the metaphorical thread of life (destiny) in Roman mythology. Decima controls the events and interactions in each life by weaving the thread into a tapestry. *When Finch discovers Justin Lee's true identity, a Chinese identity card is shown. The identity code is 15 digits, but in reality, it should contain 18. According to the number, Justin was born in Heilongjiang province, most likely in Harbin, a city north to Beijing. That form of identity code is only used in Mainland China, but according to the card, Justin Lee lives in Hong Kong where it is not used. Also, the card uses simplified Chinese characters while in Hong Kong traditional characters are used. Production Notes Bloopers and Continuity Errors *When Fusco is listening in on Elias and Beecher's conversation, Elias pauses between "He was clean," and "You got played." In Fusco's recording that he plays for Carter, there is no pause. Trivia *Greer uses a Huawei M835 smartphone. *Justin Lee's emails to his father don't sound like they were written by a Chinese native speaker. They sound more like they were translated from English into Chinese than the other way round. *The news article about Monica Jacobs was published by the New York Journal. This is the paper that Maxine Angelis, the person of interest from , works for. *This episode has the largest number of embedded code appearances to date, showing the growing effect of the virus in the Machine. Embedded Codes *The first code is an excerpt from "Balaam's Second Oracle" in the King James Bible. *The second code is an excerpt from a translated letter from Dr. Wetzel to Hinrich Lohse, the Reich Commissar for the East in 1941, confirming command's decision to use gassing devices in the elimination of all Jews "who are not capable of work". *The third code is an excerpt from "The Prince", a political treatise by Italian diplomat and theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. *The fourth code is an excerpt from "A Retrospective on Counterinsurgency Operations", a CIA report on the Tay Ninh Provincial Reconnaissance Unit and its role in the Phoenix Program from 1969-70. *The fifth code is an excerpt from an Informational Memorandum on the subject of potential threats to Information Management Systems by cyber-terrorists. *The sixth code is an excerpt from The Valley Of Fear, the final Sherlock Holmes novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. *The seventh code is an excerpt from the Introduction To Codes, Ciphers, & Codebreaking, an article by Greg Goebel on the concepts, terminology and origins of codebreaking. *The eighth code is an excerpt from a version of the Bhagavad Gita, a 700-verse Sanskrit epic within the Mahabharata. Quotes * "You think I should have a hobby. Now what would that be? Hanging around your derelict library with you, your poorly socialized guard dog... and Bear here?" (Shaw) * "I'll do everything in my power to determine his identity and render him irrelevant." (Greer, about Harold Finch) Promo es:Trojan Horse Category:Episodes Category:Season 2 Category:Embedded Codes Category:Episodes with multiple Persons of Interest